Pueblo's Colorado comeback.

When an economic development agency begins to tout itself as "the best team in business" it may seem presumptuous, unless you look beyond what appears to be hype and analyze the successes which that agency and the people behind it have recorded. In the case of the Pueblo Economic Development Corp., that description perhaps just scratches the surface.

PEDCO has, in less than 10 years, attracted to Pueblo, Colo. an array of companies that rank among Fortune 500's elite -- Unisys Government Systems, Trane Corp., McDonnell-Douglas, Kaiser Aerospace, BF Goodrich, and Eaton to name a few.

And in the process of luring more than 20 new industries and nearly 4,000 jobs to a city that once tied its future entirely to the steel industry, PEDCO has become a catalyst for renewal within the community itself. In cooperation with local business, educational institutions and government leaders, PEDCO has lead a resurgence of growth within this city of 100,000, located on the eastern plains of the Rockies.

PEDCO came into being in the early 1980s, during a time that saw the CF&I Steel Corp. enter a period of decline from which recovery seemed doubtful. Thousands of primary jobs, along with thousands more in the support industries which grew to serve the steel industry, suddenly were lost as American steel consumers turned off-shore to fill their needs. Industry down-sizing across the country was felt nowhere more seriously than in Pueblo. And with that downsizing came the realization that "single industry" economies such as Pueblo had been for generations would no longer suffice in a diversifying, global marketplace which was emerging.

Pueblo's leadership knew that immediate steps were needed to turn the tide of recession that threatened to rock the city to its core. In concern with state economic development assistance, the first coordinated efforts at identifying and then marketing the city's vast resources was undertaken.

PLAYING ON STRENGTHS

Pueblo's wealth is water. The Fryingpan-Arkansas water diversion project of the 1960s provided water in abundance -- water which, it was recognized, is the single most marketable resource to industrial growth, save one. That other resource, the one which has been cited time and again as the pivotal reason for companies coming to Pueblo, was people.

The tenacity of Pueblo's people, their willingness to adapt and their ability to acquire the skills needed to move to the next level of economic and industrial prowess, has been the primary attraction to companies which could literally have their choices of cities across the country. Many chose Pueblo, and none have regretted the decision.

By 1984, Unisys had moved to Pueblo to build the cornerstone of its defense manufacturing operations. Two years later, Unisys moved its Materials Management Center to Pueblo. In short order, companies of the likes of BF Goodrich, Kaiser Aerospace, Trane Co. and Kurt Manufacturing joined Unisys in the Pueblo Airport Industrial Park. Growth was so rapid and phenomenal that even the "mainstream" media began to take notice. Paul Harvey devoted parts of more than 20 radio broadcasts to the success of PEDCO and Pueblo. In 1986, then vice-president George Bush came to see for himself what he had been hearing. And, in his words, "when communities ask me what they can do to improve themselves, I tell them to look at Pueblo, Colorado, and do what they have done."

McDonnell-Douglas Corp. looked at the teeming southern California landscape and realized that growth would not occur there. The company's sights had to focus elsewhere -- and PEDCO was able to provide the place. Successful launches mean more contracts. Contracts for the Delta II launch booster have now lead to tripling the original Pueblo plant.

Target Stores' phenomenal growth of the late 80s demanded new and expandable storage and distribution space. Pueblo's Distribution Center today covers more than half a million square feet under one roof, with room still to grow as the need demands.

WATS Telemarketing, now the MATRIXX Corp., found hundreds of Puebloans able to quickly grasp the intricacies of inbound telemarketing for some of the countries largest (in size and volume) direct marketers. The center today is used by telephone engineers and marketing professionals as a platform for testing and developing state-of-the-art equipment and processes. "If it will work in Pueblo, it will work anywhere." And it's working in Pueblo.

Columbia House, the nation's largest distributor of music and video; PCL Packaging, the American division of the Canadian plastic bag supplier to the country's premier retailers; Doane Products Co., one of the largest manufacturers of pet food products under private label; Atlas-Pacific Corp. and its subsidiary Magnuson Corp., makers of fruit and vegetable processing equipment for the food industry worldwide; Eaton Corp.'s electronic controls manufacturing division; Kurt Manufacturing, a precision instrument and computer component maker; Pacific Aero, Krelman Co., NC Systems, Glenn Co., Century 400. Each is a leader in its field. And each has found that the place to do business is in Pueblo, Colorado.

None of these companies simply stumbles upon the site of its next or newest facility. No company today can afford to throw a dart at a map and hope that it lands on a conductive location. And in the burgeoning arena of economic site recruitment no community can sit and anxiously hope that someone happens to notice them. The catalyst to bringing company and community together has to be an aggressive, effective economic development effort, PEDCO epitomizes aggressive and effective.

ASSEMBLING THE TEAM

PEDCO was born in the era of relatively simple economic recruitment. While several hundred agencies were active in the 80s, few had the amenities to offer that PEDCO did. Pueblo's city leadership brought to the table the land, the buildings, the easements and utilities that were essential to facilitating recruitment. The University of Southern Colorado and Pueblo Community College offered the technical training programs that could turn around a work force, in some cases, within sixty days. From developed lot to on-line manufacturing plant in three months was not a promise in Pueblo, it was a ironclad guarantee. And it was delivered.

In the 1990s the landscape has changed. More than twenty-two thousand economic development agencies today are packaging their cities and counties and states, using -- as some few will admit -- the Pueblo Model. And as the number of recruiters has mushroomed, the prey has diminished. Fewer than six hundred corporate expansions and relocations a year are being made today. How has PEDCO adapted in the face of competition?

By regrouping, refocusing and turning its attention to the most fertile areas of development. For a period of time the agency maintained a full-time office in southern California. Aggressive radio and print advertising targeted industries, comparing the gridlock of the San Fernando Valley with the open space of southeastern Colorado. Prospective companies who called a toll-free telephone number for information found that information delivered -- to their office, usually the same day, by a PEDCO representative. Teams of PEDCO board members, all successful business owners themselves, descended upon companies to demonstrate the community's commitment to satisfying their needs. Many on the team came from companies which themselves had made the move to Pueblo.

Steve Jenkins, the executive director who came on board in 1992, began a blitz campaign that would rival a marching army. Trade shows in this country and abroad, the development of strong industry and business ties with Mexico in anticipation of NAFTA, the introduction of modern technology information systems, all came in the wake of this new leader.

And the successes continue to mount. Pacific Aero is retro-fitting an existing building at the Industrial Park to do high tech fabrication of titanium aircraft parts. NC Systems will have 30 employees on-line by late summer producing precision engineered machine parts in aluminum and titanium for such companies as Northrup, McDonnell-Douglas and Hughes Aircraft. Eaton Corp. built a new facility to house a manufacturing division to supply one customer, Trane Co., just across the street.

But PEDCO no longer looks only outward to find new challenges. Remember that dying steel mill that once was Pueblo's crown jewel? Today it is a thriving mini-mill, the new focus of the American steel industry. It is an operating division of Oregon Steel, the Portland-based success story that has renovated and re-tooled old mills in Oregon, California, and now Colorado. PEDCO played a pivotal role in bringing Oregon Steel together with local and state authorities who made the deal work.

And how well did it work? In the first quarter of 1994 production at the mill exceeded total production for the last ten years combined!

When local entrepreneurs identified a market for precision engineered wheels for railroad rolling stock, they turned to PEDCO for guidance in start-up operations. WheelStar will open their manufacturing facility in a retro-fitted building later this year.

And the companies recruited to Pueblo have prospered in their new environment. Industry Week Magazine in October, 1993, named Unisys Government Systems, Pueblo, as one of their Ten Best Plants in America. Not content to tie its fortune to a turbulent defense industry, Unisys today is gearing over to private industry applications of the computer technology it originally developed for military use.

Trane Co. has nearly doubled its manufacturing space, adding to the industrial and commercial chiller lines its produces in the Pueblo plant. Target Stores, as mentioned earlier, has expanded to a half million square feet. Atlas-Pacific has expanded its original plant, then acquired and moved to Pueblo a whole new division. BF Goodrich has expanded twice on-site; Kurt Manufacturing added nearly fifty percent. Columbia House, located just south of Pueblo, has nearly quadrupled the size of its operating area and has moved even more distribution functions to the Pueblo site.

LOOKING INWARD

As the success stories grew, the efforts to attract more grew with them. Total community involvement in economic development was, at times, difficult to attain. Today, its almost a runaway engine.

Early in the development of PEDCO, the voters of Pueblo approved a half-cent sales tax to be used exclusively for economic development. Twice since then they have renewed and expanded the scope of that tax. In 1992, the voters again were asked to consider the city's future. They approved bonds to build and develop a hotel/civic center complex which will bring new life to the old downtown area.

And that downtown hasn't been left out of the growth curve, either. In 1991, Health Systems International (formerly Qual-Med), one of the country's fastest growing HMO insurers moved its national headquarters into a renovated department store building across the street from PEDCO's office.

Pueblo Community College has been instrumental in developing training programs that many of the newcomers used to prepare workers for the move from blue collar to high tech manufacturing. Not content to forever be simply reactive to opportunities, PCC is today on the verge of building a multi-million dollar Advanced Manufacturing Technology Center to train workers in anticipation of industry needs.

Joe May, PCC's new president, came from Danville, VA, Community College in 1993. He saw the need to prepare a ready, highly skilled workforce, and he convinced community interests to back him in the quest. The Colorado Legislature is about to release the first four million dollars to break ground later this year for the Center.

PCC also operates the Small Business Development Center under the auspices of the US Department of Labor to assist local small start-up operations. Leading Edge curriculum and the development of several new locally-funded micro-loan sources is leading to the creation of a secondary economic base in the community.

The University of Southern Colorado, boasting both a polytechnic mission and a strong business school, has stepped forward to operate PEDCO's Southern Colorado Business and Technology Center. The incubator center is also home to the Mid-Continent Technology Transfer system. The technology database, developed by NASA to make technology and research available to the private sector, was located in Pueblo in part in response to the success PEDCO has demonstrated in economic development.

MAKING THE SALE

Teams of Puebloans are still criss-crossing the country, ever on the hunt for new opportunities and new companies to attract to Pueblo. Those teams have made some of the strongest impressions on prospective companies.

The PEDCO team isn't a phalanx of MBAs, spouting demographics and waving flow charts and projections. The teams consist of members of the PEDCO board, local business owners, insurance men, stock brokers, contractors and car salesmen, who spend their own money and their own time to go and present the Pueblo story.

And more often than not, the current PEDCO team includes at least one or two managers or owners whose companies have made the move to Pueblo and found success. They have the most telling evidence of what the move to Pueblo meant to them and their companies and their employees. They can tell of the cooperation between city and county, the utilities and the contractors, the schools and the human resources departments. They speak of the community and its amenities. Its schools and its neighborhoods; its shopping and its recreational abundance. They have become the best sales people Pueblo has.

The Pueblo way of doing things hasn't just drawn more business and industry; it's drawn the attention of the economic development community as well. Pueblo was recognized in Nation's Business Magazine earlier this year for its innovative and highly successful Quality Forum programs organized by the Pueblo Chamber of Commerce.

The Economic Developers Council of Colorado named Pueblo the Large Community of the Year for 1993. Colorado Governor Roy Romer, in presenting the award to PEDCO chief Steve Jenkins, said what many others have said about Pueblo and PEDCO: "You've got your act together."